


The Volunteer Tomato

by Magfrump



Category: The Magicians - Lev Grossman
Genre: Other
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-07-07
Updated: 2017-08-04
Packaged: 2018-11-29 03:15:38
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 5
Words: 5,166
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11432001
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Magfrump/pseuds/Magfrump
Summary: Julia is at Brakebills. Quentin isn't. He is a dick about the whole thing.In concept this could go through all of Brakebills and the fight with the beast. Past experience suggests I will complete fewer than five chapters so let's hope I get to the part you want to read about!





	1. The Vanishing Woman

Quentin Coldwater woke up the day after his interview with the Yale college recruiter. Quentin did not remember the experience very vividly. That was normal. Quentin did not form very many vivid memories. One vivid memory he had was of sitting under the dining room table with his best friend Julia, staring at their home made map of Fillory on the bottom side, planning the journey they would take there together when they discovered that magic was real.  
Unfortunately, magic was fake.  
Quentin closed his eyes before realizing why he had woken up. Quentin’s alarm was going off. Quentin opened his eyes, and painfully slowly reached over to the snooze button. Then he collapsed onto the bed in a twisted, reaching position before closing his eyes and waiting for the next alarm. Quentin did not get back to sleep that morning.

Quentin arrived at school an hour later. He had not showered. He had not eaten breakfast. He had drunk half a cup of coffee while his father muttered about the interviews from behind the newspaper. Quentin’s mother had made scrambled eggs but Quentin had simply pushed them around the plate a bit.  
Quentin was barely awake for his first few classes. When he arrived in English, however, he noticed something. Julia had disappeared. She was absent today.  
This was especially odd, as the only absence or tardy Quentin ever remembered Julia having was when she was with him, when he had broken his ankle riding his bicycle. That was 6 years ago.  
The teacher did not call Julia’s name during roll call. Julia did not arrive in class later that day, and Quentin did not see her at lunch. A part of Quentin found this very odd, but a larger part of him simply continued through the day, the same way Quentin always simply continued when Julia was not around.

Quentin should have been worried. Two weeks later, he had not seen Julia. He had performed sociability during two more interviews, and his parents and academic counselor seemed to have decided that his chances of getting at least one acceptance letter from a good school were high enough to stop pushing him into them. Sometimes, when Julia was around, Quentin would complain about the pressure from his parents to pursue a life he wasn’t passionate about, and she would remind him that moving away from them and broadening his perspective on life and the world were important parts of the college experience that he actually did want. If Quentin had had the energy to complain now, he would have asked someone what happened to Julia. Nobody else had mentioned her disappearance. Ironically, without Julia’s support, Quentin did not have the energy to look for her. Quentin found this darkly amusing.  
That weekend, Quentin did not leave his room. He practiced his magic tricks where no one could see him.

It would be Julia’s birthday soon. Quentin wondered if anyone would comment on this. What would happen if he showed up at her parents’ house? Would they even remember that they had a daughter? Quentin continued to stare at the ceiling above his bed.  
Quentin’s phone rang. He picked it up and put it to his ear, but did not speak.  
“Hey Q!” Said Julia.  
“Julia?” Quentin asked. “Jules?!” adrenaline flooded Quentin’s mind and body. “What happened? Where are you?” Quentin was sitting up, putting on clothes. He opened his mouth to speak more but only noises came out.  
“I’m okay.” Said Julia. “I got accepted into an early start program at a private college upstate. I’m sorry I couldn’t tell you earlier, it’s been a whirlwind. But I wanted to meet up with you so we could plan my birthday party! I’ll be back in town.”  
This response did not drain Quentin’s adrenaline. “What the FUCK Jules?! How could you just disappear like that? God. I. God. What.”  
“Look Q, I’m sorry—“  
“NO! NO you can’t just, just say you’re sorry? I—“ Quentin took a deep breath. “I was worried about you. I wasn’t doing well without you.”  
“I know, Q, I know. I’ll tell you all about it. Thursday, meet me at the pizza place on 36th at 7, we can catch up a little.”  
“Thursday—what, why now…” Quentin’s mouth struggled to keep up, and failed quite badly.  
“I’m sorry. I really am. I miss you Q. I need to talk to you, probably just as bad as you need to talk to me, ok? I’ll see you Thursday. I have to go.”  
Quentin didn’t manage to say anything in the ten seconds Julia waited before hanging up.


	2. Is this your card?

On Wednesday, Quentin received acceptance letters from Yale and NYU. They had response deadlines, which his father told him to write down on a calendar so that he wouldn’t forget. Quentin did not do this.  
On Thursday, Quentin decided that he would arrive at the pizza place early. He set an alarm when he got home from school. He laid in bed until the alarm went off and stared at the ceiling for ten minutes. He put his shoes back on and got a hoodie with only a couple of coffee stains on it which he laid out on the bed. He stared at the hoodie for ten minutes. When Quentin arrived at the subway station, the train was just leaving. He caught the next train and arrived at the pizza place at 7:15. Quentin considered how he had spent the last two weeks after school and decided that this should count as a success.  
  
Julia was already there. She had saved him a seat and was reading from a book entitled “40 studies for cello playing.” Two pieces of pizza were laid out on the table in front of her. She noticed him and put the book down as he approached, and smiled in a way that both made Quentin aware of the butterflies which had been tumbling around his stomach for longer than he realized, and quieted those butterflies.  
“Jules.” Quentin barely breathed her name. “It’s good to see you.”  
“Yeah.” She replied. Julia breathed in sharply through her nose. “Have a seat! You gotten any acceptance letters yet?”  
“Um, yeah, just yesterday. NYU and Yale.”  
“Damn, Q! That’s great! You should be excited!”  
Quentin shrugged. He knew he should be excited, and Julia knew that he knew that. Julia was not excited for him. He was not excited for himself. Quentin was rarely excited. Julia was often excited, at least on Quentin’s behalf. Julia was hiding something from him. She hadn’t told him she was leaving. She hadn’t talked to him for weeks. The butterflies began fluttering around Quentin’s stomach again.  
“You said… you got into an early start program or something? Somewhere upstate?” Quentin asked. He did not know if it was really a question. He did not know what answer could be satisfying for him.  
“Yeah… something like that.” Julia stared into Quentin’s eyes in the way that only she could. She saw him in a way that no one else did.  
Quentin thought she seemed sad.  
“Quentin… can you show me a card trick?”  
“Huh?”  
“You still do magic tricks, right? I know I stopped doing that with you a few years ago but I want to see one. Can you show me one? It doesn’t have to be a card trick, I just thought that would be easy for here.”  
“Uh, yeah, do you have a preference for one?”  
“Surprise me.”  
“Okay…” Quentin mumbled, and searched the pockets of his hoodie, where he found a deck of cards. He shuffled the deck, he pulled cards from it. He showed Julia his empty hands. He pulled her card from beneath the thin paper plates the pizza sat on. He remembered to eat the pizza Julia had bought for him.  
Julia smiled while he worked, and laughed a brief, genuine bark of laughter when he found the card and wiped the pizza grease off of it.  
“Quentin, the school I’m at… it’s not actually upstate. It’s here in the city. You applied there, but I guess you didn’t get in… the entrance exams were… weird.”  
“What are you talking about Jules? NYU? They didn’t have in person entrance exams.”  
“Not NYU,” Julia looked over her shoulder nervously. “I want to tell you, I need to tell you because you need to know. But I know you don’t remember the entrance exams, and I know why. I can’t just tell you.”  
“What’s going on Jules? Are you ok? I didn’t go to any entrance exams with you…” Quentin stopped.  
Julia stared Quentin right in the eye. She did not blink. Quentin blinked several times.  
“I’m going to loan you this book, Q. You should learn to play cello.” She handed him the book of hand exercises. “Go to NYU. Study linguistics, as many ancient language courses as you can. I know you were thinking of philosophy but…” Julia narrowed her eyes. “You know, the linguistics department at NYU is really good. It will be much more applicable.” Julia annunciated this last sentence.  
“Sure, I can do that.” Quentin’s mouth failed to say. Quentin nodded instead. “Linguistics.” He whispered.  
“Q, I’m going to tell you more, but let’s take a walk first.” Julia finally broke eye contact, glancing around the room as though searching for something.  
  
The next morning, Quentin remembered taking a brief walk, then going home. They had forgotten to plan Jules’ birthday party. Why did she want him to play the cello and study linguistics? He knew she had pushed him toward a few hobbies—her encouragement was why he did magic tricks, why he read non-fiction, why he read fiction for that matter. Had their friendship always been this surreal? It was hard to tell.  
Quentin remembered staring up at their map of Fillory under the dining room table, planning their journey. Maybe their friendship had always been like this.  
Quentin picked up his favorite book to reread on the Subway. “The World in the Walls” by Christopher Plover: Fillory and Further book 1.

* * *

_Foreward to The World in the Walls, Third Edition by Christopher Plover_

The first time the Chatwin children visited Fillory, I did not notice their absence. One ingredient in this happenstance was most mundane, simply that I had not yet grown fully accustomed to their presence. Not having children around the house seemed quite normal, and beyond that it was quite common in those days to think of too much contact with children as smothering. I certainly wished for them to be able to live as freely as they pleased and so even when I was aware that they were staying with me I thought nothing of their disappearing to ramble around the acres for hours on end.

A second ingredient in their absence is by far the more interesting, however. Fillory is a magical place, and magic is alive. It is seen by those by whom it wants to see it, and is ignored by the rest. Perhaps it was my old age, and I certainly hope it was not my lack of imagination!, which led Fillory to welcome the Chatwins while leaving me to simply listen to their stories. I can only thank them for including me in their wonderful journeys by way of their recounting. And I hope if I cannot repay them, I can at least prove myself worthy of the honor by imparting the same favor on you.

Welcome, new readers and old, to Fillory!


	3. Now you see me, now you don't

Julia’s birthday party somehow got planned.  
James was very disappointed that Julia hadn’t visited him when she visited Quentin. Quentin had forgotten that James existed. James and Julia had been dating before she disappeared, hadn’t they?  
Perhaps that was why James brought so much enthusiasm to the birthday party. Had they broken up? Quentin didn’t think Julia had said anything about it. That would be weird.  
Quentin and James went to central park together. James brought a giant stuffed bear and a box of chocolates, and Quentin reminded him that Julia didn’t really like the traditional mushy sorts of romantic gifts, but James said “I’ve got to do something!” and shrugged, and Quentin didn’t really know how to respond to that.  
James was attractive and sociable and likeable in all the ways that Quentin wasn’t. It must have been a very different life that James lived. Quentin liked James, but he wasn’t sure why James liked Quentin. Maybe he didn’t. They hadn’t hung out for the weeks when Julia had disappeared. Maybe they weren’t actually friends any more.

There were not many people at Julia’s party. She had mostly hung out with Quentin and James, and there were only a couple of other people from their AP English class talking and drinking soda when the two arrived. Julia was sitting with another young woman, a mousy looking girl with straight blonde hair around shoulder length, thick-rimmed glasses that looked like they could support an unspeakable level of prescription, and unremarkable dark clothes that made her look like a black hole. She was folded up on the park bench almost in a crouch, and she watched Quentin and James approach from afar from behind the cover of her knees even while she seemed to continue to speak to Julia.  
“Q! James! Hey, glad you could make it!” Julia welcomed them, rushing to give Quentin a hug and taking the bear from James. She put her hand on James shoulder and thanked him with what James may have thought was a sincere smile but Quentin thought was a pitying smile. “Alice, could you hold on to this for me?” Julia asked, handing the enormous plush to the other woman.  
“It’s been a long time since we’ve talked, Jules. How are you doing?” James started, with a veneer of confidence thick enough to hide something, but not thick enough to hide that he was hiding. “It looks like you’re making new friends.” James flashed a smile at Alice and Quentin gave an awkward wave.  
Quentin felt like a dog that had been kicked out of the house, watching another dog who was about to be kicked out of the house. Julia revisited her pitying smile on James.  
“Yeah, I guess we ended up falling in together. Sorry I haven’t called, it’s been… it’s been really busy.” Julia’s sentence ended, trailing off in the way Quentin had always worried their friendship would after high school.  
Quentin found it strange to witness the process happening in front of him but not too him. Quentin felt better about not being that close with James. James had never even finished reading Fillory and Further. He didn’t know about Martin’s struggle to return to Fillory, and Quentin wished he did because it seemed very similar to how James felt about Julia now. A distant, magical, beautiful goal that had a will of its own and had decided to remain out of reach.  
Quentin had been jealous of James when James and Julia first dated. Quentin felt a sickening moment of schadenfreude at James revisiting that jealousy now as Julia turned back to Quentin.  
“Q, let’s take a walk. James, could you get Alice a hot dog? She gets a little nervous around strangers. I think she’ll open up a bit if she has something to eat.”  
Alice gave Julia a look that would have melted Quentin’s skull had it been directed at him. Quentin found himself beginning to get aroused and gave thanks for his complete lack of expressiveness.  
“I didn’t realize you were such a social butterfly, Jules.” Quentin almost spat the words, and started in surprise at his own hostility.  
“Oh yeah, I made one friend over the course of a whole month. So impressive.” Julia dripped with sarcasm, and it put Quentin a bit at ease.  
“What’s the deal with dumping James like that?” The question came from Quentin’s mouth unbidden, not necessarily unwelcome but arriving more rapidly and familiarly than he had expected. “You didn’t even tell me what was happening.”  
Julia bit her bottom lip, and looked around. She took Quentin’s hand, and began walking more quickly, glancing occasionally over her shoulder.  
Instincts warred within Quentin, excitement at the prospect of a secret rendezvous he had always dreamed of conflicting with a strong and real sense of confusion, and knowledge that the first instinct was mistaken and misguided. When he was pretty sure Julia wasn’t looking he did his best to conceal an erection.  
Julia walked Quentin out of central park, down a few blocks and into an alleyway. She spoke some words in a language Quentin didn’t recognize and moved her fingers in a rapid, precise movements that reminded Quentin of Naruto. Then she turned, took both of his hands in both of hers, and stared into his eyes.  
Quentin stared back. His breath caught and for precious moments neither of them moved or spoke.  
Quentin began to lean toward her, pulling her hands ever so gently and lifting his foot to take a step in, and she broke the silence.  
“Magic is real Q.”  
Quentin dropped Julia’s hands.  
“What?”  
“Magic is real. I… the entrance exam. When you had your interview with Yale. We ended up in an exam room, and we took this test. It was… it was wild, I don’t know how to describe it. It moved between remembering the exact phrasing of harlequin romance paperbacks and quantum physics calculations. And… and you failed, I guess.”  
“What?”  
“And they erased your memory. They made sure you got into good schools so you could live the rest of your life and be happy and not question it.”  
“What?”  
“But I couldn’t let them just leave it like that.”  
“What the FUCK, Jules? Are you messing with me right now? What the fuck is this?” Quentin jerked his head left and right, as if seeing the dirty alleyway they were in for the first time.  
“I couldn’t let magic exist and you not know about it, Q. If magic exists you deserve it, ok? And I’m going to make sure you get it.”  
“Jules, slow down, what are you… they erased my memory?” Quentin opened and closed his hands experimentally, his arms shifting up and down without his knowledge.  
“It’s like Hogwarts, Q. If you’re not magic, or, or if you’re not magic enough they just erase your memory and forget about you. Cast people aside like that. And I couldn’t… after all those years, you were the one who believed in magic. Not me. And I couldn’t let them just… let you go on thinking, after all these years, that magic really doesn’t exist when it does. I need you to know that. But if I just tell you, they’ll make you forget again.”  
Quentin’s eyes focused for long enough to see Julia’s face, wet with tears. His mind was empty.  
“But I’ll figure it out Q. Okay? Because you’re my friend. Okay? Because of all the people in this stupid world that magic could help, I need it to help you.”  
Quentin didn’t have any words to respond with.  
“I need you to work with me Q. I told you to go to NYU. Study linguistics. Learn to play the cello, for the hand movements. I gave you that book. I’ll help you, when I can. But this is all I can do for now and I can’t even, I’ve told you three times already and you’re still not going to remember. But this is what I can do now.”  
Quentin’s vision was getting blurry, and one of his hands reached up and discovered that his face was wet.  
Julia hugged him. It took Quentin a moment to hug her back, but eventually he did.  
“Why do you get to go to Hogwarts?” He whispered, then snuffled a loud supply of snot up into his nose and sobbed. “Why do you get to go and I don’t?”  
“I don’t know Q. I don’t know.”

Quentin woke up in a cold sweat. It was Christmas break. He lived in the dorms at NYU, but back at home now for the holiday. He was not enjoying his classes. Professors at NYU did not appreciate his essays about nihilism the way high school teachers did. They asked him to cite sources and consider other viewpoints. Latin class kept teaching him different ways of saying “blood,” “murder,” and “conspiracy.” He still had a math requirement. He had not made any friends at orientation. He had gotten unfortunately drunk at a party and embarrassed himself.  
But none of those things mattered. There were only two things that mattered. One: he had just had a dream in which he had remembered his last conversation with Julia. Two: that conversation had been seven months ago.  
Quentin looked at his nightstand. There was a sticky note on it with a few words written. An address in Brooklyn, and a J. In Julia’s handwriting.


	4. Don't try this at home

Quentin arrived in the neighborhood surrounded by warehouses. A few blocks away one pulsated with electronic music, but here things were quieter. Though the sun had just set Quentin instinctively raised a hand over his eyes. He mindlessly whistled to himself and began flexing his fingers through the cello picking patterns from the book Julia gave him.

There was a flash of light, like a car with its brights on rounding a corner. Quentin recoiled, shielding his face with both arms, but the light was gone. All that remained was his recollection of it--an unfamiliar color emanating from a door positioned suspiciously between two warehouses, to what seemed like a toolshed that would have fit more naturally into a back yard with a dad infestation than a warehouse district in Brooklyn.

"Um." Quentin mumbled to himself. "I don't think visual hallucinations are usually associated with depression." And he walked up and knocked, accidentally in the rhythm of shave and a haircut. Quentin swore in embarrassment and turned to leave, but was interrupted by a slat in the door slamming open at eye level in two return beats.

"Got any stars?" Asked the unidentified eyes behind the slat.

"Is this a speakeasy?" Quentin countered.

A third, familiar voice joined them from behind the door. "Let him take the test."

The eyes disappeared, the slat closed, and the door opened to reveal two men, several years older than Quentin but still young. One wore a polo that clung tightly to his muscular frame and the other wore a t-shirt with a cartoon dog sitting in an airplane cockpit. The room was half foyer, and half diner bar. A shoe rack and coat rack sat unadorned and unused on one side of the room next to a door that, from the outside, didn't seem like it could lead anywhere. About six feet across from this was a bar which must actually have been from an old speakeasy. Next to it were three ratty stools and on the bar itself was a three ring binder laying open to a laminated page.

Quentin realized where he had recognized the voice. "Aren't you my TA?"

"Yeah, it's Jared. Nice to finally see you here, Quentin!" Jared gave him such a genuine and familiar smile that Quentin almost actually relaxed for a moment.

"Nice reunion." the third man rolled his eyes, "I'm Evan. You gotta cast light to get in the next door. Instructions on the table." Evan gestured roughly for Quentin to approach, and Quentin took in the muscles under Evan's dark skin stretching out the sleeves of his polo.

The open page of the binder had instructions almost like a recipe in a cookbook, accompanied by a couple pictures of hands and a diagram. It was titled "Sumerian Light Spell," which was written in the Papyrus font, and the next two lines were not in English.

"Why does this say Sumerian when the words are Aramaic?" Quentin asked.

"Good catch!" Said Jared.

"Shut up and cast it." Evan spoke over him.

Quentin moved his hands. He stretched and twisted his fingers to mimic the pictures. He stumbled over the Aramaic syllables. He felt... something... and it was gone.

"Fuck." He swore under his breath, and tried again.

* * *

Twenty minutes later Jared was frowning in a way that, with a little effort, Quentin could parse as condescending. Evan hadn't spoken, or stopped staring at him. Quentin wasn't actually sure if Evan had even blinked.

Quentin slammed the binder shut.

"Fun fucking way to spend a Saturday night." He declared, and left.

* * *

When Quentin got back to his apartment, he drank a pint of peach Schnapps out of the bottle and lay face down in the bed with his nose smushed against the lumpy pillow. He laid there, his breath barely pulling in through the pillow, for about two hours before finally falling asleep.


	5. And, as I say these magic words...

Quentin was in central park. His schedule would have placed him in class, but Quentin had been avoiding Jared since the night at the warehouse. Quentin was not totally sure why he was doing this, but he was very confident in the decision.  
Quentin was listening to music on his headphones and staring into the space ahead of him, oblivious to his surroundings. The music he was listening to was quite bad. The sort of stuff James would have given him a hard time for listening to. In middle school. Levels of distortion that disguised any hint of melody. Almost more like a white noise generator than a band. The words of the song were impossible to make out from the audio track, but Quentin knew them by heart. Thinly veiled references to suicide and cuss words directed at parents, interspersed with cringeworthy half rhymes.  
Quentin felt a little better about himself when he thought about how bad these lyrics were.  
Quentin started picking at the sleeve of his hoodie and noticed a leg.  
The leg was attached to a person, who was sitting right next to Quentin.  
“Oh, she was hiding a JUICY little bit now wasn’t she?” The man said, and gently pulled Quentin’s chin to stare him in the eyes as though inspecting a horse.  
“Just look at those eyes, I bet you’re hiding so much pain.” Quentin felt like this was a bit condescending, but he also wanted to confirm the accuracy of the statement. Quentin felt a little bit of shame about this. He stared blankly into the man’s eyes.  
The man kept his hand gently on Quentin’s chin, then ran his other hand’s finger down the side of Quentin’s face and moved his mouth in a whisper that Quentin didn’t track.  
“He’s not that bright though,” came a woman’s voice from behind him. Quentin turned instinctively to see one of the most beautiful women he had ever laid eyes on. It took his brain a second to process any more information than that. When it did, it told him that the two were wearing matching outfits. Deep burgundy shirts highlighted with sky blue, and each showing approximately the same amount of cleavage. Quentin turned back to the man, who was holding his hand at this point, and realized that his music was gone and his headphones were off.  
“I think that’s a forgivable flaw,” the man said to the woman, then stared deeply into Quentin’s eyes, “don’t you honey?” He drew Quentin’s hand up to his mouth and gently kissed it.  
“What is happening.” Quentin whispered, feeling very confident that he would not get a satisfactory answer.  
“A friend of yours called in a favor.” The woman surprised him by replying. Quentin felt like he was going to get whiplash looking back and forth like this. “She said there was a little puppy that needed some house training.” She pouted her lips. “I don’t know if there’s much of anything we can do to help you, though.”  
“Oh there are plenty of things we could do to help him.” The man rebutted, “But maybe not with his magic problem.”  
“My magic problem?” Quentin asked again. “Oh, god, I thought you were just… this was just a New York City Experience?” He didn’t really think that, but something had just unwound inside of him that he hadn’t realized had been so wound up. He glanced between the two again, and realized that there were several other things still wound up inside of him.  
“Oh you pure little kitten,” the man crooned, “Can’t even recognize Popper 3 when it’s on the page in front of him. Both metaphorically and literally.”  
“Just remember that there’s a reason you’ve been doing cello exercises,” the woman nearly spat her words at him, “and also try not being a little bitch next time you go to Brooklyn. I know that’ll be hard for you, but you can try right?”  
With those words she reached to Quentin’s hand that the man had been holding, and together the two of them shaped it into a form that Quentin recognized. And Quentin placed the shape, and placed it again, and connections started screaming through his mind, until he realized that he’d been staring at his hand for several minutes like a stoned person and the two people who had sat with him were gone.

* * *

That evening, Quentin went back to Brooklyn.  
Jared was there at the door. Evan wasn’t. Quentin didn’t say anything. Jared tried to start a conversation but it fell so flat against Quentin’s stone face that he stopped.  
Quentin flipped open the three ring binder, noticing a dozen more laminated pages after the one he had stared at for so long three weeks ago.  
He stared at the familiar page again.  
He pressed his hands together and warmed them, pulling his fingers in stretches and flexes as he sounded out the Aramaic syllables. They weren’t Aramaic words, though. It was something like a bad translation.  
“Do you need a minute?” Jared asked, after the silence had gone on slightly too long for comfort. “I have other things I should be doing in the back…”  
Quentin took this as his cue. He pushed his hand into shape, flowed through the motions on the page effortlessly, correctly, divinely, and the words poured out of his mouth, a Sumerian litany transcribed into the wrong alphabet. And light poured out of him, and filled the tiny room.  
Jared blinked slowly and grimaced. “Oof, that was, that was pretty good. Come on in…”  
But at that point Quentin was already pulling his coat and gloves back on and opening the door to leave.  
He stopped with the door half open and hoped that Jared was shivering a bit from the influx of chill February night air.  
“If you know those guys, just… I guess tell them that I’ll be as much of a little bitch as I want.”  
That had sounded cooler in his head.  
Quentin was relieved to be leaving.  
When Quentin got home, he did magic tricks where nobody could see him.


End file.
